SpongeBob SquarePants had just finished soaking up Ernie’s ejaculate when Bert walked in on them. “Ernie!” Bert exclaimed in a high-pitched, effeminate voice.

“It’s not what you think, Bert,” Ernie said, quickly zipping up his denim cutoffs.

Just then, He-Man came in, gripping his tumescent phallus with both hands. “You guys ready for that threeso—” Ernie nodded sideways in Bert’s direction. “Whoops.”

“What is this, an orgy?” Bert asked, his eyes welling up.

SpongeBob was temporarily distracted; watching He-Man’s overt display of power possession was triangulating his own pants around the crotch. “Not yet—the Teletubbies haven’t shown up.”

No sooner had he said this than the Teletubbies did show up—with enough Ecstasy and K-Y for everyone. Everyone but Bert, that is, who was straight-edged and boring at parties.

She-Ra entered with Velma from Scooby-Doo on her arm. “Hey, boys, the divas have arrived,” she announced, taking a hit of E and putting the truly outrageous stylings of Jem and the Holograms on the stereo.

“Ernie was cheating on me,” Bert complained, although no one was paying attention, because of an impromptu limbo contest.

“Oh, Bert, lighten up,” Batman lisped as he pirouetted in, his hand down the front of Robin’s tights. “They’re just having a little fun.”

“If having fun means destroying a commitment of years for some immediate sexual gratification, then count me out,” Bert whined.

“Sorry I’m late, I had to make a million excuses to get Barbie out of my hair,” Ken said, running his fingers through his flamingly gorgeous blond locks and winking at Vanity Smurf. “It’s exhausting keeping a beard who doesn’t know she is one.”

“You know what this party needs?” SpongeBob said, prancing up and down. “Some straight guys who are curious!”

“Yeah!” rose up a swooshy chorus.

They hit their cell phones, and within half an hour Jon from Garfield, Fred Flintstone, Inspector Gadget, Woody Woodpecker, Popeye, Bugs Bunny, and a few of the Seven Dwarfs were standing around awkwardly, hands sunk deep in pockets or, if they were animals and did not have hands and pockets, then with paws or wings by their sides. Within an hour, though, they were grinding with the Teletubbies, gulping from 1-liter Dasani bottles, declaring their previously undiscovered love for techno, and trading pectoral-developing tips. Popeye thought back wistfully on his many years at sea and wondered what he was doing with scrawny Olive Oyl. Bugs strutted around in drag and sang show tunes. Fred was a big hit, accenting certain parts of the songs by running quickly in place to create a twinkling sound.

The queer pressure finally got to Bert, who tentatively asked one of the Teletubbies if he had “any of those pills left.” After being given a warm group hug, he was told to “take one of these and join us,” although in an incomprehensible gay babble.

Bert did so, and in no time he started to loosen up and sway rhythmically to the music, which had previously seemed atonal and mechanical, but which was now melodic and delicious. He donned a rainbow tank top and approached Ernie. “Ernie, I love you,” he said, “and it’s not the drugs talking.”

“Oh, Bert, you’re the only one for me,” Ernie replied, finishing off Jon. “Let’s get married.”

“What a great idea!” Bert shouted as Inspector Gadget rimmed him with an apparatus whose original purpose was to facilitate underwater breathing and which doubled as a can opener. “Even though marriage forces mainstream cultural and political obeisance to a heterosexist state that otherwise fails to recognize us equally, let’s do it to show our love to the world!”

The entire group headed to Boston for a quick but nonetheless flamboyant ceremony, and cruised down to Fire Island for a weeklong party with assorted friends from the entertainment and fashion industries.